


a long night in the canyon

by memitims



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Getting Together, Haikyuu!! Manga Spoilers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:47:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27219643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/memitims/pseuds/memitims
Summary: “he is very special to you,” ushijima says. it’s a statement, not a question.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio, Kageyama Tobio & Ushijima Wakatoshi
Comments: 8
Kudos: 219





	a long night in the canyon

**Author's Note:**

> major manga spoilers ahead!! timeline is a tad ambiguous but tried to stay as close to canon as possible. this is a fic focused on tobio and ushijima's relationship, with a heavy dose of kghn. i haven't seen many tobio & ushijima friendship fics, so i hope i did this justice! thanks for reading :)

Tobio collapses onto the hard, wooden bench in the locker room, tipping his head back until it rests gently on the wall. His legs are shaky, he doesn’t think they could have held him up for a second longer, and his fingers feel a little numb. He wipes his face with the towel he was handed coming into the locker room and then folds it and places it across his eyes, blocking out the blinding light of the room.

It had been an exhausting match—a full five sets and Tobio played almost the whole time. He can’t think of anything but a warm shower and the cool white sheets of his bed. He knows he needs to keep moving in order for those things to happen, but he feels at peace right now, his body still and his eyes closed, only a small haze of light getting through the towel and his eyelids. 

He hears the rustling of a jersey and feels the steady weight of someone sitting on the bench next to him. 

“Are you okay?” A deep voice. _Ushijima_. 

Tobio nods and the towel slips slightly off his eyes. He pushes it back up. 

He can imagine Ushijima’s worried face in his mind. Tobio’s learned that he’s good at looking after his teammates. He wonders if it's a holdover from his time as Shiratorizawa’s captain. 

He feels a water bottle being pushed into his hands. He curls his fingers around it, trying to get some feeling flowing back through them. 

“Drink,” Ushijima says.

Tobio brings the water bottle to his lips and takes a long drink, the cold temperature of the water helping his brain whir back to life. 

“Now this.” He feels another bottle land in his lap. He sets the water bottle down on the bench next to him and opens the top of the new one. He takes a swig—it’s some sort of electrolyte drink, orange-flavored and sticky-sweet on his tongue. 

He feels a little better now, but still not strong enough to lift his head from the wall. Ushijima must understand this, because Tobio can sense him get up off the bench and kneel in front of him, and then there are strong hands grabbing his volleyball shoes and slowly untying his laces. 

“Thanks,” he mutters. 

It feels weird, he’s usually so good at making sure he doesn’t push himself past his limits, but with their second-string setter injured, five sets and a tough matchup, he had pushed himself a little too hard. Tobio kneads his fingers into his leg in frustration. He just needs to go home and sleep. At least he didn’t injure himself. 

He feels Ushijima pull his shoes off his feet and he feels a quick surge of appreciation towards his teammate. A memory pushes itself into Tobio’s foggy brain—his second year of high school, Hinata tipping his head back against the cool wall of the gymnasium, just like he is now, his overexertion obvious. After scolding him and bringing him water, Tobio had sat cross-legged in front of his friend and pulled his shoes into his lap, making quick work of the laces and gently pulling the shoes off his feet, his fingers accidentally grazing the warm skin of Hinata’s ankle and setting his fingers alight. 

_Ah_. That’s why he remembers the memory so well. He’s found his brain has a hard time shaking memories like that, ones that make him remember the warm feeling of Hinata’s skin under his fingers. He doesn’t get why they’re burned into his brain, impossible to let go of. _Stupid Hinata_. 

“What?” Ushijima says, concern apparent in his voice. 

Tobio brings his fingers up to his face, pressing them deeply into his brow. He knows he said that last part out loud. Ushijima probably thinks he’s nuts.

“Nothing,” he mutters. “I’m okay.” He finally pulls the towel off his eyes and blinks them open. The matte grey lockers across the room from him come slowly into focus. He opens and closes his palms a few times, stretching out his fingers. He’s still thinking about them trailing up the inside of Hinata’s ankle. He’s too tired to care. 

_Hinata_. He bolts upright, suddenly, startling Ushijima out of his low crouch, as he gathers the bottles Tobio had discarded and his shoes. He’d promised to text Hinata about the match. 

“Feeling better?” Ushijima asks, his deep voice slicing through Tobio’s brainstorm session of what to text to Hinata. 

Tobio nods and thanks him again. He hooks his fingers through the backs of his shoes when Ushijima hands them to him and starts towards his locker. He slides open the combination lock and lets his shoes clatter to the bottom of the locker, immediately reaching for his phone. He doesn’t understand it—Hinata’s hard to say no to in person, but it’s even harder when he’s halfway around the world and Tobio can’t stop thinking about him. 

He feels a little silly, he knows it’s not urgent and even if he doesn’t text Hinata first, he knows he’ll just send him a message asking about the game anyway, but he’s trying to be better about it lately. And, although he’ll barely admit it to himself, he misses Hinata. He’s not sure there’s a much better feeling right now than the warm flare of anticipation he gets when he feels the buzz of his phone in his pocket. 

He sends off a quick text, probably riddled with misspellings that Hinata will laugh at him for, but his brain is just too tired to spell things properly. Hinata always understands what he means.

Ushijima—now fully dressed to leave, his bag slung over his shoulder—approaches Tobio’s locker. Tobio quickly begins to undress, pulling off his damp jersey and exchanging it for a black t-shirt. 

“I’m walking you home.”

“Okay,” Tobio says. He doesn’t live that far from their arena and he knows he’ll probably get home fine at this point, but he’s not going to argue with Ushijima. He bows his head quickly in thanks. 

He feels a little lame, having to be taken care of and walked home, but it feels kind of nice, also. This, too, feels like an old memory—but this one he can’t place. He wants to tell Ushijima that he’s a good friend, but the words get stuck in his throat. _Another time_ , he thinks. 

Ushijima Wakatoshi: _Would you like to get dinner?_

Tobio types out a _yes_ and tells him he can be ready in twenty minutes. They had practice earlier in the day and he had been doing nothing but sitting on the couch and flipping through the television channels, barely even registering what was playing on the screen. Ushijima’s text made him feel deeply relieved. He needs to get out of his tiny apartment, filled with nothing but dim lights and his own thoughts. 

He takes a quick shower and throws on some casual clothes. Tobio figures they’ll go to the small _katsudon_ restaurant down the street from his apartment. It’s one of Ushijima’s favorites and they’d been there more times in the last month than Tobio could count. 

Ushijima rings the doorbell exactly twenty minutes after Tobio had texted him. _His accuracy is freakish_ , Tobio thinks. 

Tobio—too hungry to waste time inviting Ushijima inside—texts him that he’s coming down and rushes down the stairs. He finds Ushijima standing at the doorway to his apartment, hands in his pockets. Tobio feels relieved to see a friendly face, anything that’s not just glimpses of his own pale one in his bathroom mirror. 

“ _Katsudon_?” Tobio asks. Ushijima nods and turns on his heel, heading down the street towards the restaurant, Tobio following closely behind. Ushijima walks fast, his stride heavy and certain, and Tobio has to quicken his own to keep up. 

It’s a small restaurant, tucked into the corner of the street, the five wooden stools practically out on the sidewalk. They take their seats and order quickly. Tobio’s stomach rumbles. 

“You are hungry,” observes Ushijima.

“Yeah,” Tobio says. “I didn’t have much for lunch.”

“I should have texted you earlier.”

Tobio waves him away with his hand. “Don’t worry. This place is pretty quick, anyway.”

They sit in an easy, calm silence for the next few minutes as they wait for their food. Out of everyone on their team, Tobio likes Ushijima’s company the best. It never feels awkward, even when they sit in silence, when neither of them has anything to say. He likes the comforting quiet of their friendship and the easy conversations they fall into—about volleyball, their teammates, Miyagi. He admires Ushijima’s straightforwardness and his dedication and the way he slams the ball down into the other side of the court—a straight, level path, never wavering. 

He wonders if he would have stayed on the Adlers for so long, if not for Ushijima. 

When their food arrives, Tobio digs into it hungrily, only stopping to remark how good it is once his bowl is halfway empty. He thinks they have the same conversation about how good the _katsudon_ is every time, but it feels comfortable and right. Like the sun rising in the morning.

“I heard Hinata Shouyou made the Black Jackals roster.”

Tobio chokes on his pork. 

He drops his chopsticks on the table to pound at his chest, then gulps down almost a full glass of water while Ushijima looks on with mild concern. 

“Y–yeah,” Tobio says, setting the water glass back down on the table. “I know.”

Ushijima nods, looking Tobio up and down. “And we’re playing them in a few weeks.”

“Really?” Tobio asks, hating how his voice cracks a little. This, he didn’t know. He’s always bad at keeping track of the upcoming schedule.

He nods again. Tobio feels his chest tighten. He didn’t think it would be so soon. And he’s surprised Hinata hasn’t texted him about it. Although, if he knows Hinata, he’s just as bad at keeping track of things as Tobio is. His mind starts to race. He wonders if he’ll see Hinata when they get off the buses, or in the open hallway of the gym or when warmups start on the court. He tries to imagine what he would say. _Hi_ or _good to see you_ or _you really are tan_. He’s seen plenty of recent pictures of Hinata, and he promised Tobio that he grew a few inches taller, but his heart rate starts to speed up when he thinks about what he’ll look like, _really_ look like in person. 

Although—Tobio reminds himself—he could hardly care about all that. What he really wants is to see Hinata play volleyball. 

“Kageyama?”

Tobio goes blank for a second before he remembers where he is, in the _katsudon_ restaurant down the street from his apartment, with Ushijima Wakatoshi, and not the ghostly imaginings of the boy he hasn’t seen in three years that are playing in his head. 

Ushijima’s still staring at him, although probably for good reason. Tobio knows he’s being weird as hell. He picks up his chopsticks again and pokes at his rice, feeling Ushijima’s dark eyes drill a hole into the side of his head.

“He is very special to you.” It’s a statement, not a question. 

If Tobio had a piece of pork in his mouth, he would have choked again.

“Yeah,” he says quietly. “I guess he is.”

“You should tell him that,” Ushijima continues. 

Tobio shrugs. 

Ushijima sighs and goes back to eating his food. Tobio copies him, shoveling the rest of his dinner into his mouth. They eat in silence for a few more minutes. Tobio wonders when Ushijima figured it out. Or maybe he’s always known. He always has this sinking feeling that it’s rather obvious, the way he feels about Hinata. Maybe Hinata—with his pure obliviousness—will be the last one to know. Tobio can’t entertain the possibility that he already does.

“I can’t wait to beat him.” Ushijima pulls Tobio out of his thoughts again. Tobio’s glad that Ushijima’s taking the lead in this conversation. He doesn’t know where his head’s at. 

Tobio cracks a small smile. “Same here.”

Tobio peers down the aisle, trying to make out the items on the tall racks. He always has the hardest time finding knee pads in the store. Ushijima follows closely behind him. 

“I think they must be down here,” Tobio mutters. He’s pretty sure he sees the familiar blue and gold of a Mikasa ball. Sure enough, he finds the volleyball section towards the end of the aisle, tucked between the tennis and badminton equipment. 

Ushijima finds the knee pads before Tobio does and he rummages through a few pairs before finding his size. He draws back and picks up one of the Mikasa balls, twirling it around with his fingertips. Tobio kneels down and picks through the small plastic packages. He finds the same black ones he’s gotten since he was five and tucks them under his arm. 

His eyes catch on a pair of bright orange knee pads, tucked behind all the black ones in the back of the pile. Tobio hesitates for a moment, then grabs them and stuffs it behind the other one under his arm. 

He gives Ushijima a thumbs up. Ushijima drops the ball back into the wire bucket of volleyballs and starts towards the end of the aisle. As they step out of the aisle, Tobio hears a quiet, small voice saying his name. 

“Kageyama...Tobio?”

Tobio looks down at the source of the voice. A little girl in a blue Vabo-chan t-shirt is staring up at him with big round eyes, clutching a small pair of volleyball shoes in her arms. 

“Hi,” Tobio says, crouching down a little to get closer to her eye-level. “Are you a Schweiden Adlers fan?”

“Yes!” she says excitedly, throwing her arms up in the air and dropping her shoes. Tobio bends down to pick them up for her. 

“Would you like me to sign your shoes for you?”

She nods. Tobio watches her eyes flit over to Ushijima. She casts her gaze down, shyly. 

“Do you know Ushijima?” Tobio asks gently. 

She nods again. “Yes. But I couldn’t remember his name.” She pauses for a beat. “Sorry.”

“Not a problem,” Ushijima says. “My name is Ushijima Wakatoshi. Nice to meet you.”

He leans down and puts out his hand. She grabs it with her tiny fingers and shakes it. 

“Can I have your autograph too please, Mr. Ushijima?”

“Of course.”

Tobio runs off to the checkout counter to borrow a Sharpie. When he gets back, Ushijima is talking to the little girl about serving. He catches the sound of his name and _jump serve_. 

“Where would you like us to sign?” Tobio asks. She points to the outside edge of her volleyball shoes, handing Tobio and Ushijima each one. They each take a turn with the Sharpie. Tobio scribbles his well-practiced signature across the side of her shoe. He holds it up to admire his work and then hands it back to her. 

“Nice to meet you,” Ushijima says. “Keep working hard on your serve.”

“I will!” she squeaks out, waving goodbye to the two of them and scampering off in the direction of her mother. 

They pay for their knee pads quickly and in relative silence. Tobio’s lost in thought as they exit the store. He stares down at the orange knee pads in his shopping bag and wonders if they were a silly purchase. When they get to the corner where they have to split up in different directions, Ushijima stops him with a hand to his shoulder. 

“Kageyama,” he says. “I’m going to Poland.”

“Oh,” says Tobio. He can’t think of much else to say. He knew it was coming eventually, Ushijima’s contract with the Adlers was over soon and he was good enough to play practically anywhere he wanted. 

“It’s a strong league and a better salary,” Ushijima continues. “I will miss the Adlers, though.”

“Yeah,” Tobio says, still floundering for the right words. “It will be good experience.”

“Undoubtedly,” Ushijima nods. “The details haven’t been worked out yet, so I will still be in Japan for a while longer. Probably until after the Olympics. I will let you know when I found out.”

“Okay,” Tobio says. “Thanks for telling me.”

He knows he’s not being the warmest and he knows Ushijima didn’t have to tell him this early at all. But he needs to go process it before he can really talk about it with Ushijima. First, he had Hinata announcing that he’s going to go play professional indoor in Brazil, and now this. Tobio thinks he might need to start researching other leagues. 

“I’ll see you at practice tomorrow?” Tobio asks, desperately trying to change the subject. Ushijima tells him yes and they say their goodbyes. 

Tobio meanders home, his head stuck somewhere up in the clouds. Only the vibration of his cell phone in his pocket is enough to pull him out of it. 

Hinata: _i’m in the area can i come over tonight?_  
Hinata: _will be later,, can be just to sleep_

It’s unfair how much Tobio’s heart rate picks up. 

Tobio: _yeah_

He’s on a mission, the rest of the way home. When he gets back to his apartment, he does the dishes, picks up the living room and straightens the bed. He thinks about pulling out the spare futon from his closet, at least for the pretense, but he knows Hinata will end up in his bed anyway. There’s no point to it.

Hinata storms through his door at 11:30pm and it takes him all of five minutes to make three new dirty dishes, open his bag up all over Tobio’s couch and mess up the covers on the bed. Tobio sighs. He doesn’t know why he bothered in the first place. 

Tobio rummages through his bag and pulls out the orange knee pads. He throws them at Hinata’s chest. Hinata easily catches the plastic package.

“Oh?” Hinata says. “What’s this?”

Tobio suddenly feels horrifically shy. _Jeez, you’ve known him for like six years, get it together_. “Nothing,” he mumbles. “Just some knee pads.” And then, he adds, for really no good reason, “They match your hair.”

Hinata beams and clutches them to his chest. “I love them. Thanks, Kageyama!”

Tobio relaxes at the sight of his smile. Hinata sits down on the couch, still clutching the knee pads in his arms. Tobio decides the knee pads were not, in fact, a silly purchase. Worth it, for a chance to make Hinata smile. He watches him and he must zone out for a moment, because suddenly Hinata’s looking worriedly up and him and asking—

“What’s wrong?”

Tobio fiddles with the fabric of one of the blankets draped across the couch, then moves to sit down next to Hinata. He swallows. 

“Ushijima’s going to Poland after the Olympics.”

“Oh,” Hinata says. “He told you today?”

“Yeah. This afternoon.”

Hinata scoots closer to him, swinging his legs up onto the couch and lowering his torso down. He ends up with his head on Tobio’s thigh. Tobio fights the urge to run his hand through the soft hair pillowing on his leg. 

“I’m sorry,” Hinata says, his lips ghosting over Tobio’s skin. “I know you guys have been really close lately.”

“Y–yeah.”

“I’m sure you wish he didn’t have to leave.”

Tobio nods and Hinata turns his head to look up at him, his big, dark eyes scanning Tobio’s face. He stares right back at them and is pretty sure they grab on and pull the next sentence out of his mouth by force. 

“I wish you didn’t have to leave either.”

Tobio looks away. He knows that really wasn’t fair to say, knows he’s being selfish, knows that Hinata is going to Brazil because it’s the best for himself and his career and Tobio doesn’t want to get in the way of that, not at all. He wants to keep meeting Hinata on the same stage, no matter where they both are. 

But he also feels like a weight has been lifted off his chest. He’s never told Hinata how he feels about him, but this feels like a baby step closer to the inevitable. 

“I know,” Hinata murmurs softly. Tobio still can’t look him in the eye. He lets his fingers reach out and touch the ends of Hinata’s orange curls. His fingertips feel like they’re on fire. It’s the only thing keeping him from saying more stupid stuff. 

Then, Hinata shoots up quickly from the couch, startling Tobio. 

“Your contract is up soon too, right?”

“Yeah,” Tobio breathes out, staring at Hinata as he bounces up and down on his toes. 

“Why don’t you go somewhere cool, too!”

Tobio thinks for a second. “I’ve always liked the Italian league.”

“Yeah!” Hinata exclaims. “I bet you’d look good in red and green and white. Wait, that’s the Italian colors. Right?”

Tobio lets out a surprised laugh. “Yeah, that’s right.”

Hinata starts pacing around the room, talking excitedly and mostly to himself, about the jerseys and what he’s seen of the Italian league on television, and—

“Hinata,” interrupts Tobio. He stifles a yawn. “Let’s go to bed. I’m tired. We can talk about it in the morning.”

“Yeah, okay,” Hinata says, gathering up his things from the living room and practically running to Tobio’s room. Tobio knows Hinata is way too worked up to actually go to sleep anytime soon, but it's good to get him in the mindset, at least. 

When they do finally get ready to sleep, Tobio reaches over and cards his fingers through Hinata’s hair, feeling a lot braver in the darkness and the comfort of his own bed. Hinata reaches back and clutches a small piece of Tobio’s sleep shirt, right at the bottom hem. He likes the feeling of Hinata’s warm fingertips brushing against the skin above his hip. Hinata makes a small noise, which Tobio can only describe as _happy_ , and if they wake up tangled around each other in the morning, well no one has to know. 

Hinata flops down on his hotel room bed and Tobio sits down in a big chair next to the window. They had found each other after their respective teams’ meetings and were supposed to go get food together, but Hinata was looking mighty comfortable on the light blue sheets of his bed. 

“Hinata,” he groans. “Aren’t you hungry?”

Hinata brightens and flips around in the bed to stare at Tobio, resting his elbows on the bed and his chin in his hands. “Of course. I just need fifteen minutes to relax.”

Tobio sighs. “Okay.”

“Plus, are you sure you want to be seen fraternizing with the enemy?”

He cracks a small smile. “My teammates already gave me shit for it. Can’t get much worse than that.”

Hinata laughs, clear and true, the sound filling up the small hotel room. Tobio almost feels the need to clutch at his chest. 

“Where are we going to eat, anyway?”

Tobio scoffs. “How should I know? I’ve never been to Rome.”

Hinata throws one of the decorative pillows at his head, playfully, his laugh still ringing in Tobio’s ears. Hearing it over the phone was great and all, but it was nothing compared to the real thing. For a second, Tobio wishes he could bottle up the sound and put it in a jar, so he could listen to the delicate noise of Hinata’s laugh whenever he wants.

“Me neither, silly,” Hinata says. “But you _have_ been living in Italy. Can you look something up?” He throws in a little pout, for good measure, which doesn’t really matter because Tobio’s already pulling out his phone. 

He spends a few minutes looking through nearby restaurants on his phone and as he clicks into the details of a specific one, a text comes through at the top of his phone. 

Ushijima Wakatoshi: _Look at these. Very delicious._

There’s an accompanying photo of a pile of beautifully decorated chocolate truffles, piped with all sorts of different colors and patterns. Tobio types a quick question back.

Tobio: _Tendou’s?_

Ushijima sends him a thumbs-up emoji. Tobio clicks into the picture and holds his phone up to Hinata’s face. 

Hinata squeals. “Those look soo delicious! Are those Tendou’s?”

“Yeah. Ushijima sent me the picture.”

“Ooh!” Hinata swipes at his phone, stealing it from Tobio’s grasp. “I wanna text Ushiwaka.” 

Tobio watches him as he hovers his fingers over the keypad, his teeth worrying his lip as he thinks about what to say. Some of his bangs fall across his eyes and Tobio feels the sudden urge to sweep them out of Hinata’s face. He stares and stares and desperately hopes that Hinata is too preoccupied with his conversation with Ushijima to notice. He really missed him. He missed his grabby hands and his messy hair and the way he sprawls out across any possible surface and his stupidly pretty brown eyes. 

_He is very special to you. You should tell him that._

Tobio gulps. 

_Okay, Ushijima. Here goes._

“Hinata,” Tobio says. “I think...I mean...” He starts over. “I love you.” 

“Eh?” Hinata says, barely looking up from the phone. Tobio feels a little incensed at his lack of reaction, that he just said the three words that he never imagined saying to anyone in his entire life, until Hinata pushed his way in and changed his mind. 

“Did you not hear me?” Tobio says, a little bit of anger creeping into his voice. 

Hinata laughs. “Kageyama Tobio,” he says, drawing out the end of Tobio’s name. He finally looks up from the phone, his big eyes staring straight at Tobio. His anger immediately disappears. “I know that, you idiot.”

“Oh.”

Hinata laughs again and points a finger at Tobio. “You were getting so angry,” he teases. 

Tobio crosses his arms over his chest. “I just said _I love you..._ ” He practically whispers the last three words. “And you basically ignored me!”

Hinata laughs and laughs, before suddenly going quiet. “I love you too,” he says, after a long pause.

Tobio grabs the throw pillow Hinata threw at him earlier and abruptly stands up from the chair, towering over Hinata where he lies on the bed. 

“I’m going to smother you,” he threatens, before Hinata smacks the pillow out of his hands and pulls Tobio down on top of him by his wrists. 

“You’re always all talk,” Hinata says, and then he moves up to kiss Tobio, wrapping his hands around his back and pulling their bodies flush against each other. It’s soft and light, and Tobio immediately weaves his hands through Hinata’s hair, deepening the kiss and pulling him closer. 

It feels a little unreal to Tobio, the moonlight streaming in through the curtains and the way Hinata’s lips move against his, gently and naturally, like they’ve been doing this for ages. Maybe they have been, in a way. But nothing compares to kissing Hinata, _really_ kissing Hinata, and when they pull apart, Hinata’s hair is messy and Tobio lightly tugs on the bright strands to remind himself that this is real. 

Hinata pulls him close again and murmurs “Do you want to get food?” against his lips.

“Not anymore,” Tobio says, even though he knows they _will_ get food eventually, they have a big game tomorrow and they can’t skip dinner the night before. But for now, he’s content with ignoring the rumbling in his stomach and staying in bed with Hinata. 

_Thanks, Ushijima_ , he thinks, and then immediately loses all thoughts as Hinata flips them around and kisses him some more. 

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me on [ tumblr](https://memitims.tumblr.com) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/memitims).


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